Xu Huang

Perceived Interactional Justice and Trust‐In‐Supervisor as Mediators for Paternalistic Leadership

This study identifies the influencing processes that underlie the effect of the three paternalistic leadership dimensions on subordinates work performance/organizational citizenship behaviours. The results, based on data collected from private firms in China, showed that perceived interactional justice mediated the effects of moral leadership and benevolent leadership on trust‐in‐supervisor. However, perceived interactional justice did not mediate the relationship between authoritarian leadership and trust‐in‐supervisor. In addition, trust‐in‐supervisor was found to be positively associated with work performance and organizational citizenship behaviours. Cultural and practical implications and future research directions are also discussed.

Harming High Performers: A Social Comparison Perspective on Interpersonal Harming in Work Teams

This study developed a multilevel model of the interpersonal harming behavior associated with social comparison processes in work teams. We tested this model using temporally lagged data from a sample of student teams (Study 1) and cross-sectional data from a sample of work teams in a telecommunication services company (Study 2). In both studies, social relations analyses revealed that in teams with less cooperative goals, comparison to a higher performing team member was positively associated with interpersonal harming behavior, but only when expectations of future performance similarity to that member were low. The interactive relationship of social comparison and expected future performance similarity with interpersonal harming was buffered, however, in teams with more cooperative goals.

Professional commitment, organizational commitment, and the intention to leave for professional advancement: An empirical study on IT professionals

Purpose – Given the increasing influence and importance of professionals in modern society, this study aims to investigate the influence of organizational commitment and professional commitment on professionals intention to leave their organizations for professional advancement (ILPA).Design/methodology/approach – A total of 500 members of a large Hong Kong association of computer specialists were drawn randomly from the membership list. E‐mails were sent directly to those 500 members through a web‐based survey, which is an effective way to collect confidential information and potentially reduced the resistance due to the survey sensitivity. After two follow‐ups via e‐mail, a total of 265 responses were collected with a response rate of 53 percent.Findings – The study found that organizational affective commitment (OAC) would be more effective for reducing ILPA. For the interactions between different commitment components, there is a substitution effect of professional affective commitment (PAC) and prof...

Expertise dissimilarity and creativity : the contingent roles of tacit and explicit knowledge sharing

In this study, we investigated whether team-level knowledge sharing moderates the effects of individual-level expertise dissimilarity on individual employees creativity in research and development (R&D) project teams. Expertise dissimilarity--defined as the difference in expertise and knowledge between a focal team member and her or his fellow team members--was operationalized in terms of the research department to which each member belonged. In Study 1, multilevel analyses of data collected from 200 members of 40 R&D project teams in a telecommunications company revealed that a team member with expertise dissimilar to that of her or his teammates was more likely to exhibit creativity when the project team as a whole engaged in higher levels of tacit, rather than explicit, knowledge sharing. In contrast, a member whose expertise was similar to that of her or his teammates was more likely to exhibit creative behavior when the team engaged in higher levels of explicit, rather than tacit, knowledge sharing. These findings were largely replicated in Study 2 using data collected from 82 members of 25 project teams from another telecommunications company.

The influencing mechanisms of paternalistic leadership in Mainland China

In leadership research, Western leaderships are quite dominant while insufficient attention has been paid to Eastern leaderships, including Chinese leadership. Paternalistic leadership, an indigenous Chinese leadership, is prevalent in Chinese society given that it has been bounded by the cultural tradition. Yet, it is necessary to further explore the divergent influencing mechanisms of paternalistic leadership in Mainland China. The primary objective of this research was to replicate and empirically test a model on paternalistic leadership and in-role/extra-role performance by using trust-in-supervisor as the mediating variable. With the data of 239 supervisor–subordinate dyads collected from a textile firm in Mainland China, we conducted statistic analysis of structural equation modelling, multi-level analysis and so on by applying Amos 5.0 and SPSS 12.0. The results showed that trust-in-supervisor completely mediated the relationship between supervisors authoritarian leadership and subordinates in-role/extra-role performance, and trust-in-supervisor completely mediated the relationship between supervisors moral leadership and subordinates in-role/extra-role performance, whereas trust did not mediate the relationship between supervisors benevolent leadership and subordinates in-role/extra-role performance. Overall, by investigating the influencing mechanisms of the three elements of paternalistic leadership in the Chinese context, the current research not only adds a cultural perspective to paternalistic leadership literature but also advances our knowledge of the underlying psychological processes that paternalistic leadership works. The research confirms that paternalistic leadership is applicable in the context of business organizations in Mainland China. Since prior research has provided little theoretical guidance on the effect of paternalistic leadership on performance, this research contributes to the literature by identifying and examining the social exchange and social identity mechanisms of trust-in-supervisor. It highlights the great significance of trust-in-supervisor in explaining paternalistic leader effectiveness and leader–employee relationships in Mainland China. It explains how the three elements of paternalistic leadership have the differential effects upon subordinates trust-in-supervisor, and it provides some cultural insights on paternalistic leadership. The results of the current research also shed light on how practicing managers may foster appropriate leadership styles in order to facilitate subordinates in-role/extra-role performance. The results indicate that moral leadership and benevolence leadership are positively related to trust-in-supervisor, while authoritarian leadership is negatively related to trust-in-supervisor. Hence, supervisors who wish to obtain subordinates trust and trigger their motivation would better abandon authoritarian leadership and adopt moral leadership and benevolent leadership instead. When subordinates have unsatisfactory in-role performance and extra-role performance, supervisors need to look into the details for the solutions, especially, in the areas of ‘trustworthiness’ and ‘paternalistic leadership’. In addition, human-oriented human resource practice is advocated, and leadership programme could be developed accordingly for business organizations in Mainland China. This research also highlights the fact that further research should be conducted in order to advance our knowledge of paternalistic leadership.

The impact of participative leadership on job performance and organizational citizenship behavior: distinguishing between the mediating effects of affective and cognitive trust

This study examines the mediating effects of cognitive trust and affective trust on the relationship between supervisors participative leadership behavior and subordinate work outcomes, using data obtained from 247 dyads in a manufacturing organization located in mainland China. Structural equation modeling revealed that while affective trust fully mediated the relationships between participative leadership of supervisor and subordinate job performance and organizational citizenship behavior, cognitive trust had non-significant effects. These findings underscore the importance of interpersonal interactions between the supervisor and subordinate for engendering subordinate work outcomes. They also lend support to the exchange (relationship)-based explanation as to how trust enhances the response of subordinates to the participative leadership behavior of their immediate supervisor, given that affective trust involves a process of social exchange between both parties over an extended period of time.